Only After Disaster
by doodleflop
Summary: Sasuke has moved schools and keeps running into the same annoying blond, who isn't quite like people he's met before. Naruto is curious about the new snappy, angry kid. He suspects there is something beneath the moody facade. AU. Gang wars. NaruSasu.
1. Yet Another Hellhole

**A/N: Hey! Soooo I'm a new author on here, so be nice. ;) I'll be focusing on this fanfic mainly, but updates may be spontaneous until the end of May (when my exams end).**

**Summary: Sasuke has recently moved schools and keeps running into the same annoying blond, who isn't quite like the other people he's met before. As for Naruto, he's curious about the new brooding, snappy, foul-mouthed kid at school. He suspects there is something going on beneath the moody facade. AU. Gang wars/divide. NaruSasu.**

**Rated M. Beware of: foul language, drug use, underage drinking, sexual situations (some with, some without, consent), violence and minors generally getting into trouble/sticky situations.**

**MALE-MALE RELATIONSHIPS. If you are offended by this, please move along.**

"**Speaking." '**_**Thinking.'**_

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**Chapter one: Yet Another Hellhole.**

God damn it. Why did they always have to stare?

By now, Sasuke was used to the drill. He signed up at a school, he received a 'grand tour', people obsessed over him, he got into a few fights, a few months passed (followed by more fights), and then bam - he'd be in the principal's office, hearing about how the man has to 'regrettably expel' Sasuke from the school after 'causing too much havoc' and 'disrupting the education of his peers'. Psh.

But still. That didn't mean that the staring that accompanied being the 'new kid' was ever more comfortable with practice.

Sasuke wearily trudged behind the school secretary as she swept along the corridors, overly-happy and practically bouncing off the walls. Was it even legal for someone to be this energetic and _happy_ at this time in the morning? No, Sasuke didn't think so. She was irritating him so much, in fact, that he'd completely turned off his ears. Detached them from his brain. He figured he'd rather pay the consequences of 'being rude' than spontaneously explode due to the rainbow-and-unicorn-and-sparkles emitting secretary. If she ever vomited, it was probably glitter.

"Sasuke? Are you listening?"

"Huh?" Sasuke grunted, awoken from his daydreams of glitter-vomiting unicorns/secretaries.

"I said," she began again, no hint of annoyance or impatience (to Sasuke's disappointment) "that this is your first class of the day. It's, uh, English. Literature. Would you like me to introduce you to the class?"

"No." The black-haired boy rudely rolled his eyes and shoved past the secretary, pushing the classroom door open with a little more force than necessary. It rebounded off the wall with a bang, creating a nice, dramatic entrance. It had kinda been an accident, and so he had to do his best to look undeterred by the act. He casually shoved his hands in his jeans pockets and slouched across the room towards the teacher, ignoring the rest of the class (because he could feel their eyes following him). He heard the secretary close the door behind him quietly.

"Oh, um, you must be, er... The new kid. Errr. Sasuke, was it?" Geez, this teacher wasn't prepared, was she? Sasuke nodded glumly but did not speak, raising his head slightly only to take in her appearance. She had dark-ish purple hair, tied back messily and spiked up (less from styling, more from 'I just rolled out of bed and forgot I owned a comb'). Sasuke snorted.

"Something funny?" she frowned.

"No."

"Okay, good," she smiled sweetly. She seemed like the type of person to have an explosive temper. "You can call me Anko. I assume you've been shown around the school?"

Sasuke shook his head and Anko's frown deepened.

"You sure? The secretary usually does that." Sasuke realised that he'd probably received the tour already, but had been too busy wishing he were dead to notice.

"No. She said someone else would. Someone from your class." Usually he'd do anything to avoid having to communicate with a 'peer', but this was a shot in the dark in hopes of getting some time out of class.

"I'LL DO IT!" boomed an over-enthusiastic voice from somewhere to Sasuke's left. He almost groaned out loud. Either that was the secretary's son, or someone was as eager as he was to get out of class. Unfortunately, Anko scoffed and shook her head.

"Not wasting time outta my class! Naruto, you can show him around _after_ class," she crossed her arms. Sasuke figured that Naruto was the over-enthusiastic-voice-from-somewhere-to-the-left. He sighed.

"Go park your ass wherever there's a space. We're doing 'Waiting for Godot'," Anko shoved a copy of the infernal novel into his chest and Sasuke grunted in annoyance but took it, slowly turning to his left and facing the train-wreck that were his classmates. They were all wide-awake and attentive, all staring at him. The new kid. Some of the girls were giggling and flicking or twirling their hair. Most of the guys were doing their best to look bored, but looked sort of interested as to where he was going to sit. Being the asocial bastard that he was, Sasuke grumpily took the only seat that had spaces next to it; it was next to the window, and the closest person was two chairs along. A girl with bubblegum pink hair. Kind of weird. Throughout the class, she kept glancing over at him, and Sasuke began to regret his choice.

By the end of the class, he'd worked out that the amount of times 'pink haired girl' looked over at him was directly proportional to the speed, and frequency, at which she twirled her hair. At this rate, she'd twirl it until she ripped it out.

As soon as the bell rang Sasuke struggled to his seat and made a beeline for the door. His plans were thwarted by a tanned hand attached to an orange arm. Well, an arm covered by an orange hoodie. A stupid orange hoodie. What kind of idiot wore _orange?_

"Yes?" Sasuke quirked at eyebrow questioningly at the owner of tanned-hand-and-orange-arm. Which was an annoying-looking male with too blond hair and too blue eyes, and a grin that was too wide.

"I'm supposed to show you around!" the grin achieved the impossible and stretched even further across his face. If it went any further, it was going to tear something. Hopefully something fatal.

Sasuke weighed up his options: next class (which was, err...) versus being dragged around the school by orange-hoodie-kid. As much as he wanted to avoid the second option, he was already sick of the condescending teachers (although he knew they'd be like this for at least another week).

"Whatever," Sasuke rolled his eyes. The blond must have taken this as an acceptance because he yelled 'awesome' before practically skipping off down the corridor. Sasuke ground his teeth. What was this, the 'people-who-emanate-rainbows' school?

**! ! ! ! !**

To say that the tour had been unenjoyable was probably the understatement of the year. Sasuke had spent practically the entire time resisting the urge to gag, because his blond companion (whom he'd been instructed to call 'Naruto') had been _fucking annoying_. He just... Never quit. His happiness was grating. No matter how many sarcastic and snappy comments Sasuke sent his way, he just seemed undeterred. It was like he had an anti-Sasuke shield. And nobody had ever had one of those before. It actually kind of pissed him off. It had even progressed to the point where he was flat out calling the kid a moron, an idiot and 'Narutard', and still that grin did not yield. By the end of the tour, Sasuke had almost made it a personal challenge to somehow get that grin off of his damned stupid face. He hadn't, and they'd parted as the bell for lunch break rang (and Sasuke had made sure to send one of his best scowls the blond's way). Hmph.

Lunch break: one of the most daunting times of the day. Not only did he have to battle against the sort-of-nice smells that the food (which he knew was going to be disgusting) was emitting, but he also had to deal with the waves of people that would try to, god forbid, _talk_ to him. Sasuke sat at an empty table in the corner and attempted to look busy, in a 'don't you dare approach me' way, by pulling out his mobile phone and staring intently at the screen like he was doing something important. He was actually just playing Bubble Blaster.

The first brave approach-ees were two girls; one was tall, skinny and blonde with legs that went on for miles, wearing a skimpy skirt and tank top. The other was a slightly shorter girl with slightly more conservative clothes (and by that he meant a skirt that reached just above her knees, rather than looking like a belt). The one with the... Uh, bright pink hair. Sasuke blinked. How obnoxious. And then he noticed that he'd lost his game of Bubble Blaster, and scowled. He waited for them to say something, but they didn't; they obviously wanted him to start the conversation. Once Sasuke realised this, he made a pointed effort to ignore them.

"Um, hi," the pink-haired girl eventually broke the silence. The blond girl just stood there twirling her hair and grinning.

"Do you want something?" The girls seemed kind of put off by this answer, and seemed to fumble for a few minutes to grasp something clever to say.

"Just came to see if you wanted to talk," the blonde said casually. "I'm Ino. This," she nudged her friend "is Sakura. Since you're new and have no friends, we thought we'd be hospitable and offer you conversation." She grinned, obviously pleased and thinking that she was doing him a favour.

"No thanks," Sasuke brushed them off and started a new game of Bubble Blaster. The girls frowned. "I'm doing something important. Bye." He put extra stress on the word 'bye', and luckily the girls weren't stupid enough to not take the hint. They frowned deeper and pulled a face at each other before scurrying away.

Silence at last. Sasuke must have been lulled into a false sense of security, because he almost jumped out of his skin when he suddenly heard a too-loud "Hi!" booming in his right ear. Startled, he almost dropped his phone on the table. And... Oh god.

"Oooh, bubble blaster. Awesome!" Narutard grinned gleefully. Sasuke wanted to punt kittens. Cute, fluffy, adorable kittens.

"Seriously, what the hell," Sasuke muttered grimly, more of a statement than a question. Did this blond not get the hint? "Go die in a fire," he snarled and stood up sharply. He was about to leave, but then he noticed something. The corner of the Naruto's mouth was twitching. The grin on the blond's face faltered and then wobbled and then fell to a thin line. Sasuke could have cheered, but he refrained and settled for smugly stalking away, feeling immensely happy with himself.

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**A/N: Hope you liked it. Seriously, I always dislike the first few chapters. Characterisation and blah, blah, blah... Promise it'll get more interesting soon!**


	2. Volatile Reactions

**A/N: Thanks to the people who added this to their story alert list, and a special thanks to Cibiboy for the review & favourite. :)**

**Look how fast I did this chapter. Wooo, go me. Hope you enjoy!**

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**Chapter Two: Volatile Reactions**

"Well, you're a douchebag." Sasuke had heard the person approaching from behind, and so the sudden voice cutting through the silence did not take him by surprise.

After finding the majority - well, scratch that, all of them - of his peers to be insufferable, Sasuke had opted to find somewhere quiet to go to after lunch instead of returning to class. The place had turned out to be the roof of the building.

"Cool," he said bluntly, taking another drag of his cigarette. He was sat on the edge of the building, attempting to smoke himself to death. Sasuke glanced over at the person who'd seemingly followed him, and it was a kid with tangled, messy brown hair and a weird twisted grin. The boy advanced and stopped a few footsteps away from Sasuke, who coolly raised an eyebrow.

"I'm Kiba. _Naruto's friend._ And I heard what you said to him back there," Kiba practically growled. Sasuke figured that he was referring to the fact that he'd requested Narutard to go and die in a fire. Yeah, it had been a pretty mean comment - but he was always nasty to everyone.

"I don't give a fuck if you're the 'new kid' here and didn't know that his parents died in a fire, because either way, that was fucking harsh." This kid was swearing like it was going out of fashion. And, ouch. Sasuke refused to acknowledge that he may have felt a _tiny_ pang of guilt for that. Seriously, he hadn't known that. It had been the first death that had popped into his mind. Heh, maybe he was psychic.

Sasuke knew that that wouldn't have changed a thing, though. Even if he had know that Naruto's parents had been lost due to a fire, he'd have still made the same comment. Because he was a bastard like that. "I don't care," Sasuke eventually said, exhaling a cloud of smoke in Kiba's face. Apparently this wasn't on Kiba's list of acceptable answers, because he quickly closed the gap between them and grabbed the black-haired boy roughly by the collar with both of his hands. Sasuke dropped the remainder of his cigarette over the side of the building but otherwise did not move.

"You don't care? How fucking _low_ are you? His _parents are dead_. I'd like to see you go through that much pain," the boy growled and tipped the other further over the edge of the building. Sasuke wrinkled his nose because, ugh, Kiba had a bad case of dog breath.

Kiba held Sasuke there for a few moments. Sasuke was not scared; he knew the kid did not have the guts to actually push him over, and so he waited, slightly annoyed, until the boy deemed it suitable to pull him back and release his grip. He eventually did, with a shake of his head.

"You're one fucking weird kid."

"And you smell like dog. Go away." Kiba seemed shocked, in the way that one is when their victim, whom they'd threatened to push over the edge of a tall building, only comments on how their breath smells. "...Case and point," the boy growled. "Stay the hell away from Naruto; the last thing he needs is bastards like you in his life."

Sasuke resisted the urge to make a smartass comment about how it was the blond who'd been chasing _him_ around all day as Kiba retreated. The roof door slammed shut behind him and Sasuke rolled his eyes. What a drama queen.

**! ! ! ! !**

The bell signalling the end of school rang a short while later, and Sasuke begrudgingly staggered to his feet (after spending the last few hours of school slumped in the corner of the rooftop, coat hood pulled up to shield himself from the cold) and wandered over to the exit. He made his way downstairs and followed the stream of bodies to the front of the school, where there were school buses waiting. Sasuke located the correct one and pushed his way inside, choosing an empty seat next to the window. He glared out of the window and attempted to look as moody as possible in hopes of someone annoying sitting next to him.

He had to admit, that the blond was the last person he'd ever thought would sit next to him.

Sasuke swore he felt his eye twitch in annoyance as a sudden retina-burning mass of orange dived onto the seat beside him with a resounding "Hi!". Did this kid never give up? Especially after what Dog-Breath had told him (if it was true, anyway). He'd have thought that he was probably Narutard's least favourite person right now.

"What do you want?" he managed to force out, eye still twitching.

"Sheesh, don't burst a vein," Naruto huffed, sticking his tongue out in a childish way. Sasuke had to resist the urge to hit him in the face.

"Why do you insist on following me around?" Sasuke gritted his teeth. Naruto was silent for a minute, thinking.

"I dunno. Well, I guess it's because you're-"

"Shut up," Sasuke hissed, cutting him off. He'd suddenly decided that he didn't care what Naruto thought, and did not want to hear his reasons for following him around all day. Actually, he couldn't physically stomach being this close to him right now. Sasuke stood up suddenly and lunged across Naruto, half-falling into the middle of the bus but grabbing one of the poles for support, and pressing the button to signal the bus to stop. It screeched suddenly to a halt and Sasuke had to cling to the pole so that he didn't faceplant in front of a bus full of people.

He straightened up and exited the bus. Fuck this, he was walking home.

**! ! ! ! !**

God damn it, if he'd known that halfway home it was going to start raining, he'd have forced Narutard off the bus rather than getting drenched himself. If Sasuke hadn't been in an Earth-shattering mood beforehand, he was now. He practically snapped the key in the lock because he twisted it so hard, and then he almost tore the door off its hinges and threw it at his smug-looking brother's face.

"Have a nice day at playschool?" Sasuke clenched his teeth to stop himself from actually screaming and grabbed the nearest thing to him (which happened to be an expensive vase), hurtling it at his brother. Of course his brother dodged it, and it shattered against the wall behind him.

"Clean that up."

This time, Sasuke did scream. But it came out more as an angry, strangled growl than an actual scream. His hands gripped at the edge of his shirt and twisted, to stop himself from breaking anything else. He stormed up the stairs as loudly as possible, before slamming his bedroom door shut (with an effect, he hoped, that rattled the entire _street_).

Inside his room, he slumped against the room and slid down until he was sat on the floor. He sighed, all anger suddenly gone, suddenly feeling very tired and... Just wary in general. He didn't like his new school, he decided. The people there were too overly-happy and infectious, and he just wanted to punch the majority of them in the face. The teachers were polite and helpful to an irritating point. The secretary needed putting down. The girls stared. And that blond idiot was just plain confusing. Sasuke knew he'd gotten to him earlier (after all, he'd seen his grin die), and he refused to let go of the slight sense of accomplishment he'd felt after doing that. Fuck, he really was a complete asshole. He didn't linger too long on this thought however, because Itachi stepped silently into his room. Itachi didn't question Sasuke's position on the floor (and if he was wondering about it, it didn't show), and Sasuke offered no explanation - only glares.

"Don't alienate yourself from the people in your school. Remember, this is the last one in the area. And you need to finish school." The implications of being kicked out of this school were left unvoiced, but Sasuke knew them clearly: he'd be stuck without an education. And as much as he hated school, he recognised that nowadays to get anywhere in life, he'd need qualifications. Especially if he wanted to get away from Itachi.

"I know that's not why you came in here," Sasuke said coolly, meeting his brother's unwavering gaze.

"You have something important to do in a few days. Keep your strength up." And with that, he was gone.

**! ! ! ! !**

Haven woken up an extra thirty minutes early (so that he could avoid the school bus and instead walk), Sasuke was not in the best of moods. The walk would have helped clear his mind, had he not constantly run into one schoolkid after another. Some he recognised, some he did not, but all of them greeted him and attempted to start a conversation. The amount of people he'd brushed off that morning had to be in the billions by the time he reached the front gate of the school.

First lesson today: chemistry. He had to admit that he liked the sciences (but physics was the best, of course). Sasuke had been vaguely looking forward to the lesson, especially upon walking into the class and realising they were doing a practical experiment, but apparently he was cursed. And late.

"Thanks for honouring us with your presence," the teacher snapped, and Sasuke almost collapsed at his feet and worshipped him. A teacher that wasn't some kind of unicorn-loving, flowery pushover! Sometimes he craved the snappy comments.

"Whatever," he just mumbled, crossing his arms.

"Had you been here earlier, you would have been able to pick your own lab partner. However, since you're..." the teacher glanced at the clock on the wall behind him. "Over ten minutes late, you're going to have to partner with..." Sasuke watched as the teacher looked around the class, and followed his eyes. To his horror, most people seemed to already be in pairs, which just left him...

No.

"Naruto. He'll explain what you have to do."

No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, NO. His inner-child stamped his foot and shook his head and threw a tantrum. Part of him (uh, most of him) wanted to just turn on heel and walk straight back out of the class again. He refrained. Sasuke turned slowly until he saw the blond and began walking towards him. Naruto grinned and started waving over-enthusiastically, as if the black-haired boy hadn't seen him. Sasuke's feet stopped and twitched. He had to give his feet a quick pep-talk as to why they couldn't turn him right back around and march straight on out of this class and this school: because low attendance rates got you kicked out of school. And this was only his second day. Sasuke begrudgingly took his seat beside Naruto.

"Sooooo, we have to mix this stuff with this stuff, this stuff, this stuff and this stuff, and record what happens," the blond gestured to different bottles of chemicals with each 'this stuff'. He was too preoccupied to be enthusiastic this time, because he was holding up a bottle of acid and squinting at the half-corroded label. Sasuke couldn't help but notice that his voice sounded a lot nicer when he wasn't screaming every word.

"Here," Sasuke said warily, holding his hand out for the acid bottle when Naruto nearly dropped it. The blond grinned apologetically and handed it over. "Just... Set up three different test tubes in the rack," Sasuke instructed, because he couldn't be assed to do it himself. Narutard didn't complain. Three dropped (and broken) test tubes later, Sasuke's nerves finally snapped.

"I swear to god, if you drop another test tube on the floor, I will pour this hydrochloric acid over your face." He conveniently left out the part where the acid was too weak to do any (properly) destructive damage. The blond seemed confused and unsure what to say, but eventually settled on laughing nervously and hoping that Sasuke was joking.

"I'm being serious, idiot. Be careful," Sasuke hissed. Because sooner or later their teacher would notice that their group had used about twenty test tubes more than the others.

"No you're not," Naruto grinned.

"Yes I am," Sasuke deadpanned, 'accidentally' spilling acid all over the blond's hand, who yelped and quickly ran it under the tap.

"What the hell?" the blond spluttered. "Why are you such a douchebag?"

"Why are you such a moron," Sasuke retorted, thanking the heavens as the bell rang and he swiftly left, leaving Narutard to clean up the mess. He justified this by reasoning that Naruto was the one who had _made_ the mess. Not that he needed to justify his actions.

**! ! ! ! !**

At lunch, another boy came and sat at his table. At first Sasuke frowned, but the boy seemed quiet, reserved. He wasn't emanating rainbows or grinning painfully or irritatingly trying to befriend Sasuke - he just sat there silently. He was a boy that looked about the same age as him, with long brown hair and slightly unnerving eyes. They had to be contacts. He was slim and had a stoic face. Sasuke decided that he didn't mind the company; he appreciated the silence.

This ritual occurred for about three days: Sasuke would sit down, play some meaningless game on his phone, study or read a book to pass the time, and the brunet would sit opposite him and say nothing. Sasuke felt a slight hint of comradery between them, something that was shared in the silence. On the fourth day, the brunet spoke. Sasuke paused and put down his physics textbook to make sure it wasn't his ears deceiving him.

"I'm Neji," and suddenly there was a hand extended across the table. Sasuke inspected it for a second before reluctantly shaking it.

"Sasuke," he said eventually. And then a third person sat down.

He looked... Unusual, to say the least. On his forehead was a bright red tattoo of the kanji for 'love'; the red matched his short and unruly (and also red) hair. The boy had obviously spent the entirety of his time doing his thick, black eyeliner to even pay attention to his messy hair. His skin was pale, and his eyes were pale green and piercing.

What was this? The 'pale-skin-and-unnerving-eyes' table? (Sasuke hated to admit that he was also pale, and had a hella good death glare.)

The redhead stared unabashedly at Sasuke for a few minutes - just staring, saying nothing. And then eventually he spoke. His voice was slow, calculated and quite rough, as if he never spoke much. And when he did, he chose his words carefully.

"How are your parents doing?"

Sasuke felt a ripping noise beneath him somewhere, and realised that it was probably himself tearing his textbook in half. A quick glance down confirmed that he had about five pages now scrunched up and sticking out of his right fist. He managed to keep his face calm, and he matched the redhead's stare. The redhead smirked.

"They picked a good school to send you to." And then he was gone, disappearing in the crowds.

If he'd had a choice, Sasuke would have spent the next half an hour brooding over this encounter and sulking. As it was he didn't have chance, because suddenly there were two girls stood at his table. Again. Sakura and Ino. Sakura seemed a bit more nervous this time; she was twiddling her thumbs. Ino did not.

"Hey guys," he grinned foxily, looking between Sasuke and Neji. "There's a party going down at Limelight tomorrow night. Wanna come?" Sasuke knew were Limelight was. It was a grotty little club down some shady backstreet alley. It would probably have gone out of business years ago, had it not taken on a 'don't tell, won't ask' policy regarding age/Ids (of course, this rule was unspoken, but the place had eventually become known as the drinking spot for minors).

"Sure," Neji said, the tips of his mouth curling up slightly in amusement as he looked at Sasuke, who immediately replied "No." The girls looked disappointed.

"Come on, Sasuke..." Ino whined. "It'll be fun," she practically purred. Sasuke shuddered and was about to reject their offer a second time when Neji caught his eye.

"You should make the effort to socialise. At least a little. And you need to lighten up," the brunet was still looking slightly amused. Sasuke desperately wanted to say 'no' again, but a small part of him rebelled and asked 'why not?'. This small part of him tore through his brain, halted the 'no' in its tracks and eventually wriggled out in the form of a choked "Alright then." Ino looked smug and pleased with herself.

"Great! We're meeting at about nine. See you tomorrow!" Sakura squealed, looking like Christmas had come early. The girls skipped away and Neji snorted.

"I don't know why the girls love you so much. You're a complete ass."

"I know," replied Sasuke, stabbing a finger at the touch screen of his phone in frustration. "No need to remind me."


End file.
